"Butterick’s Practical Typography"is the best book on typography that I have ever seen. I became interested in typography soon after I bought my first Apple computer. I used a tape recorder to store files because Apple had not originated the disk drive yet. It was the first personal computer to offer typography.

Mathew Butterick not only wrote the book, he created the fonts and controlled every detail of the organization, layout, andtypography.

As you read it you are impressed at how clear the type looks, and how easy the book is to read and how easy it is to understand what the author is saying. The book is an experiment in writing a book for reading online about typography for print. It is also about creating web pages, and he recommends emailing PDF documents.

He strongly recommends that you invest in a professional font, but he provides his recommendations of the best system fonts for you to use for different purposes. He covers everything about layout and typography with his professional knowledge and expressed opinions..

I experimented by sending one of our Mac user group’s email newsletters as an email attachment, and received a positive response—much better than the usually rare response.

"Butterick’s Practical Typography" is available online for you to read to see if you like it. It is not free. If you like it, he asks that you pay for it by buying one of his fonts, buying one of his other recommended professional fonts, buying his other book Typography For Lawyers, or making a small donation of $5 or $10 for it.

The proof that typography is important in selling what you want to conveyis that I yearned to buy the two fonts he used, or at least another professional font. Being old, retired, and on a recession reduced income, I sent him $10 in appreciation, and am keeping an archived copy for reading offline.

You can read "Butterick’s Practical Typography" online at practicaltypography.com. Then you can decide if you like it enough, and which option to use, to pay Mathew Butterick for it.